 | | Formed in 2006 after late-era Black Sabbath members Ronnie James Dio, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler, and Vinny Appice reunited after a 15-year hiatus for three new tracks on the Dio Years compilation, Heaven & Hell, named after Sabbath's first recording with Dio in 1980, toured under the moniker in 2007 and released the two-disc CD/DVD Live from Radio City Music Hall later that year. |
 | | As the incomparable voice of thrashing beast Judas Priest, Rob Halford defined the role of the metal frontman. |
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 | | Finland's first foray into the international heavy metal arena -- at least the first one hailed by critics and fans alike -- Oz's 1983 LP, Fire in the Brain, unfortunately proved to be a one-time case of capturing lightning in a bottle for a band whose career was otherwise mired in personnel issues and terribly inconsistent music. |
 | | Perhaps second only to Rob Halford, Iron Maiden's Bruce Dickinson was the most acclaimed and instantly recognizable vocalist to emerge from the New Wave of British Heavy Metal movement of the early-'80s. |
 | | Iron Maiden may have enjoyed their biggest commercial success with singer Bruce Dickinson at the helm, but it was original singer Paul Di'Anno who played an important role in the British metal quintet's early formative days. |
 | | After his rude 1999 dismissal from heavy metal legends Iron Maiden following two thankless tours of duty, singer Blaze Bayley(previously of promising Tamsworth, England metal maniacs Wolfsbane) launched a new band bearing his name in the year 2000. |
 | | A separate entity from the Ian Gillan Band and distinct from Ian Gillan the solo artist, Gillan was a band bearing the ex-Deep Purple frontman's name which provided an outlet for his straight-ahead hard rock inclinations (as opposed to the prog rock tendencies of the Ian Gillan Band or Ian Gillan's more polished solo material of the 1990s). |
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 | | At the time of their first recording, pioneering New Wave of British Heavy Metal group Samson consisted of guitarist Paul Samson, bassist Chris Aylmer, drummer Thunderstick(real name: Barry Graham; concealed his identity by wearing a rapist-style mask), and vocalist Bruce Bruce, better known as Bruce Dickinson. |
 | | Flotsam and Jetsam initially showed a lot of promise within thrash metal circles and, though they've continued to record over the past 15 years, their talent and professionalism never quite translated into significant sales or mainstream recognition. |
 | | For a brief spell during the mid-'80s, the heavy metal quintet Dio were one of the top U.S. concert attractions, boasting one of the most over the top stage acts of its time loaded with props and special effects (lasers, explosions, a giant dragon, etc. |
 | | Keyboard virtuoso Derek Sherinian made a name for himself in the post-Dream Theater world of progressive metal both as a sideman and a solo artist in his own right. |
 | | Italian heavy metal guitarist Luca Turilli is quite an anomaly. Born in Trieste, Italy on March 5, 1972, Turilli is right in the Gen-X demographic but is totally untouched by alternative metal trends of the ‘90s and 2000s. |
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 | | Judas Priest was one of the most influential heavy metal bands of the '70s, spearheading the New Wave of British Heavy Metal late in the decade. |
 | | At a time when pop was dominated by dance music and pop-metal, Guns N' Roses brought raw, ugly rock & roll crashing back into the charts. |
 | | Comparable to Metallica, Anthrax, Megadeth, Exodus and early Testament, Meliah Rage is among the thrash metal/speed metal bands that came along in the mid-'80s. |
 | | Originally, there was a band called Alice Cooper led by a singer named Vincent Damon Furnier. Under his direction, Alice Cooper pioneered a grandly theatrical and violent brand of heavy metal that was designed to shock. |
 | | This Swedish glam-metal quintet was formed in 1988 by vocalist Andy Pierce and guitarist Jonnie Wee, with Dick Qwarfort (bass), George Swanson (drums) and Roger White (keyboards) completing the line-up. |
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 | | Metallica was easily the best, most influential heavy metal band of the '80s. Responsible for bringing the genre back to Earth, the bandmates looked and talked like they were from the street, shunning the usual rockstar games of metal musicians during the early '80s. |
 | | Symphorce is a heavy metal band from Hamburg, Germany, which, though often lumped into the power metal category, actually offers much more than that subgenre's standard blueprint, via more progressive and extreme metal elements. |
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 | | A Colorado band formed in 1981, Jag Panzer's style was basic British metal influenced by bands like Judas Priest and Iron Maiden. |
 | | Rising out of the expansive early '90s thrash metal landscape, New York's Prong carved a niche all their own with their minimalist urban take on the genre. |
 | | Switzerland's most successful hard rock band, Krokus enjoyed international popularity in the 1980s and onward for their aggressive, straightforward variety of European metal. |
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 | | The late-'60s power trio format made famous by Cream and the Jimi Hendrix Experience sent inspirational shockwaves across the rock & roll universe, and among the most isolated examples of its influence must have been eastern Iowa's extremely obscure cult hard rock band Truth and Janey. |
 | | San Francisco's Vio-Lence were one of the late arrivals to the '80s thrash metal party, and while they bore all the regular sonic traits of the genre, they never really had the chance to develop in the short time allotted to them. |
 | | The onetime frontman for hair metal hitmakers Skid Row, singer Sebastian Bach was born Sebastian Bierk in the Bahamas on April 3, 1968. |
 | | German guitarist Axel Rudi Pell is one of heavy metal's masterminds, thanks to his spiraling playing techniques and pinch-hitting riffs which crafted Pell as a mainstay in the hard rock genre for the majority of the hair metal '80s. |
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 | | Scottish hard rock outfit Heavy Pettin' was formed in Glasgow in mid-1981 when the trio of guitarist Gordon Bonnar, bassist Brian Waugh and drummer Gary Moat--known collectively as Weeper--added vocalist Steve Hayman (a. |
 | | The Canadian heavy metal band Helix formed in 1974 in Kitchener, Ontario; comprising singer Brian Vollmer, guitarists Brent Doerner and Paul Hackman, bassist Keith Zurbrigg, and drummer Brian Doerner, the group debuted in 1979 with Breaking Loose. |
 | | The first band signed to skateboarder, occasional musician, and Jackasser Bam Margera's record label, Filthy Note, Vains of Jenna formed in early 2005 in the small Swedish town of Falkenberg, touring southern Europe and the U. |
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 | | The rap-metal outfit Limp Bizkit was formed in Florida in 1994 by vocalist Fred Durst and his friend, bassist Sam Rivers. |
 | | Vocalist Zachary Stevens spent much of the 1990's singing for Floridian heavy metal institution Savatage before quitting midway through the year 2000 to attend to some family business. |
 | | With their brutal, simple riffs and aggressive, fast tempos, Accept were one of the top metal bands of the early '80s, and a major influence on the development of thrash. |
![Stand Up and Shout: The Dio Anthology [Japan] Album Cover](http://images.slacker.com/isv1/album/v1/927742/aol/1/center/5,0/70.jpg "Stand Up and Shout: The Dio Anthology [Japan] Album Cover")
